Meet the "Grim Keeper"

An afternoon with Scott Buckmaster in Cadillac’s Maple Hill Cemetery

By Al Parker | Nov. 11, 2023

Scott Buckmaster slides out of the driver’s side of his hefty GMC pickup, shrugs off a light rain as he walks briskly past half dozen grave sites, and shoves a fiberglass marker with a bright orange top into the ground

Buckmaster—“Buck” to almost everyone he knows—is a sexton at Cadillac’s historic Maple Hill Cemetery, and he uses these highly-visible shafts to mark spots that need repair and a little bit of love across the 68-acre burial grounds where more than 12,000 rest.

“This cemetery, Maple Hill, is a cathartic place for me,” says the 52-year-old, who retired from teaching art at Pine River in December 2022. “I get to see things that make me smile every day, and I end my days smiling as easily as when I entered them. In a place that to many is a location of infinite sadness, I have found so much growth and seen so many incredible things.”

Was it tough for him to leave the hustle and bustle of the classroom to work virtually alone all day?

“After 45 years of educational ‘first days’—that is how many I had,” he says, “I saw the buses all gone from the CAPS garage parking lot when I drove by it and I smiled. I am not necessarily conflicted by my retirement, as I’m thankful I was able to work in that career as long as I did and that I now have the chance to start anew.”

Fixing Foundations and Finials

When he was hired by the city, Buck was hoping to do a lot of lawn mowing, some light cleanup, and little else.

“I felt that was a valid desire for a retired teacher,” he says with a smile. “Though it would be loud and require hearing protection, it would be a quiet time like snow blowing in the winter. It would give me moments to think, plan, and ponder. What I have come to know during this time is I see things that need fixing and then figure out how to solve the problem or right a wrong done by time and nature. I really love finding stones and bringing them back to the light.”

For example, one workday, Buck’s supervisor Gabe Marine was able to commandeer a backhoe from the Cadillac city garage. Buck, Marine, and other city workers lowered eight huge markers that had failing foundations, one on the verge of toppling over.

“I made forms for new concrete foundations so these 150-year-old priceless art pieces will stand for another 150 years,” says Buck. “The foundations were poured and the stones reset. The ones missing their finials will also get a new one courtesy of the form from Casey [Danford] at Training Mask.”

Every day is new and different at Maple Hill and Buck savors every work shift, every project.

“There are so many things to fix,” he says. “Not because of poor upkeep, but it’s a matter of time and nature. Every day is new and different from the day before. In the cemetery, I have learned that every day is a first day and that life is better lived that way.”

A painter and artist himself, Buck is often called upon to use his creative eye while on the job, whether he’s admiring the artistry of a headstone or helping restore it to its former grandeur. He says some of Maple Hill's stones stand out for their simplicity, while others are more ornate and complex.

“I’ve grown to appreciate the stones that have porcelain images on them,” he says. “The portraiture really helps to direct a visitor’s understanding of just who they are standing before and looking upon. Many are a snapshot of a couple memorialized for all time. Typically they are happy moments of people’s lives well-lived. They’re a wedding, candid, or happy gathering images. Some are images of an individual whose life was cut short…being a visual artist, I appreciate the hints and information shared in these images.”

Several finials—the ornate toppings of many of the older graves—were refurbished by Buck during the late summer.

“It’s interesting walking, finial in hand, through the aged granite and finding stones that plead for attention,” he says. “Between adding these architectural touches back to the cemetery’s skyline, leveling foundations, finding and re-assembling markers, and straightening others that have given way to gravity, the cemetery is flourishing.”

Handling History and Heartache

The cemetery isn’t just a place of work for Buck—it’s a place to dive into the history of the area dating back to the Civil War. Several of Cadillac’s most prominent families are in their eternal resting places at Maple Hill, including popular mayor James Haynes and the ubiquitous Mitchell family of Mitchell Street, Lake Mitchell, and Mitchell State Park fame.

“Every day I view thousands of markers and understand they’re representative of a trillion moments in human lives,” Buck says. “To say this place humbles me is a monumental understatement.”

One stone that Buck discovered during a recent mowing session was just a small slice of granite peeking through the soil, and he marked it with a fiberglass dowel.

“It turned out to be a sunken baby marker on the Cummer family baby plot,” recalls Buck.

Born in Toronto in 1823, Jacob Cummer arrived in Clam Lake in 1876, according to the Wexford County Historical Society Museum. With his son, Wellington, he secured cutting rights across the region to provide lumber for his mill. The Cummers provided the new village with water and electric services and built several miles of logging railroads. They were prominent lumber barons.

“The main family plot is located to the west of this baby plot and is marked by an immense monolithic stone crowned with a blanket draped urn finial,” explains Buck. “The main baby stone incorporates four children’s names. This small stone was set to the south of the main baby stone and lost to time. I surmise it to be a baby death after the creation of the multi-baby stone.”

Buck carefully removed a layer of soil and uncovered initials on the small stone face. “I smiled at the tentative glimpse I was given of those initials,” he says. “I made a wrong [into] a right and raised the stone to stand proud once again.”

Not all of his days are full of such success, however. Some are stained by heartache.

One day he was filling holes when he was stopped by a crew of Superior Monument delivery workers. They had a stone to deliver and had been looking for a plot for about 15 minutes.

“I asked the name of the person,” recalls Buck. “When they told me the name, I sighed and told them I knew precisely where the plot they were looking for was.”

The stone was for one of Buck’s former students, a teen who had taken his own life. With the delivery team’s permission, Buck took a few minutes to watch them set the boy’s stone through teary eyes.

“He was a genius kid who I enjoyed in class, but he was now forever 16.” Buck wrote in his “Grim Keeper” Facebook account. “I stared at my reflection in my student’s mirror black stone reading the poem worn into it. The sky broke open and the rain mixed with my tears on my face. As I drove back to the garage this time, I stopped to appreciate a lily that had taken root in our southeast field. I stopped because I could, and so many that can and should, don’t. The ‘people’ I work around every day have taught me that.”